by Francis Ray
He started after her to ask what she was talking about, then decided he’d do better with Madelyn. His mother could be bulldog stubborn. He’d just have to call Madelyn.
* * *
Breathless, Madelyn answered on the sixth ring. “Hello?”
“Why didn’t you answer the phone sooner?” Daniel barked, her labored breath sending waves of jealously through him.
“I was finishing my exercise. What do you want, Daniel?”
His relief was short-lived. He almost looked at the phone. Madelyn had never sounded impatient with him in the past. “I don’t want you seeing my mother.”
“Tough.”
“Tough?” he repeated incredulously.
“We had a great time talking about fashion, movies, and sometimes just nonsense. I thoroughly enjoyed her company and the baby has a right to know its father’s mother.”
His grip on the phone tightened. It was all he could do not to tell her again he was not the father.
“Daniel, I have another call coming through. Good night.”
The line went dead before he could tell her not to hang up the phone. Angrily he pushed the redial button, only she didn’t switch over to talk with him. He barely kept from banging down the phone. He knew what his mother was trying to do. Let them talk and meet all they wanted, but it wasn’t going to matter to him.
* * *
“Daniel doesn’t believe the baby is his,” Madelyn said as she sat next to Felicia on the couch, a bowl of unbuttered popcorn between them. Exactly one week had passed since she came into Madelyn’s life.
“So history repeats itself.” Sighing, Felicia removed her size-six feet from the cocktail table where Madelyn had insisted she place them to get the best effect on watching the black-and-white movie classic on TV.
Madelyn turned wounded eyes to her. “Felicia, I promise I’m not lying. I’m not like those other women who wanted only money from Daniel. This is Daniel’s baby.”
Felicia’s delicate hand covered hers. “Of course not. You misunderstood. I meant Daniel. You see, he was born four months and three weeks after I married his father.”
Madelyn’s mouth gaped.
“I see I shocked you. It came as a shock to my parents, too. They fully intended me to marry some successful man of my race who was of the same social circle, not fall desperately in love with a full-blooded Muscogee Creek who was as poor as the proverbial church mouse.” Felicia sighed. “One look at John Henry, and I knew he was mine.
“As the only child of wealthy parents, ‘no’ wasn’t a word I accepted. I always got what I wanted. My father used to say I demanded my way from the day I was born, and I wouldn’t stop until I had it, or those around me would pay.”
“You must have changed,” Madelyn offered—she hadn’t seen Felicia do one selfish thing. She went out of her way to be kind and helpful to Madelyn. She was accepting, nonjudgmental, and respected Madelyn’s privacy.
“Thank you, but not until after I lost Daniel’s father,” she confessed.
“So what happened to make the two of you get together?” Madelyn asked, curious and hopeful at once.
Felicia smiled with the memory. “I sent him a letter, saying my parents were shipping me off to England to marry one of my father’s business associates’ sons and told him, if he wanted me and his child, he better come and get us.”
Madelyn laughed, liking the woman’s style. “So he came running.”
“In a flash. Two days later I woke up one night with a hand over my mouth. John Henry kidnaped me. We left in his beat-up pickup and were married when we reached Oklahoma. Of course I wasn’t that easily gotten back after the way he acted, so he took me to a little cabin and proceeded to try and win me back. I can’t ever remember being happier. He ate every bite of burnt food I set before him.”
“How romantic,” Madelyn said, smiling.
“My parents didn’t think so. The only reason they didn’t call the police and file kidnaping charges was because they knew I was pregnant and in love with John Henry.” She wrinkled her nose. “It probably helped that I called every day for a couple of weeks and sent them a copy of the marriage license.”
Madelyn’s dark brows drew together. “Obviously they came around.”
“Only after Daniel was born. I begged John Henry to call my parents. They fell in love with Daniel and decided they’d rather try and get along with their poor but proud son-in-law than give up their daughter and grandson. I left the hospital thinking all my dreams had come true.”
This time it was Madelyn who placed her hand over Felicia’s. “You could call him.”
“I’m afraid it will take more than a phone call. You see the new improved Felicia. I could be a real rich-bitch when I put my mind to it.” Her voice trembled. “I pulled that stunt one time too many. He walked out of my life two years ago, and I haven’t heard from him since.”
“Does Daniel or Dominique?”
Felicia nodded. “All the time. They split the last Christmas holidays between the two of us. They love their father very much. I wonder why sometimes that they don’t hate me for driving him away.”
Madelyn remembered Daniel’s poor concept of marriage based on his parents’ stormy past. She understood him more being around Felicia. Madelyn just wished she loved him less.
“You’re too vibrant to hate, and your grandchild is going to love and adore you.” Madelyn stood, unwilling to admit there wasn’t hope for both of them. “I know what’s wrong with us. No butter on the popcorn.”
* * *
Somehow Madelyn wasn’t surprised to see Daniel lounging against a big black truck as she pulled into her parking space in front of her apartment two days later. He looked handsome and dangerous in a black Stetson, white shirt, and sinfully tight jeans.
Truthfully she had expected him or a phone call before now. She and Felicia saw a lot of each other.
Yet, by unspoken agreement, John Henry and Daniel’s names were never mentioned in their conversations since Monday night. From his hard expression, Daniel hadn’t come to declare his paternity or his affection.
Since she didn’t want the entire complex to know her business, she opened her front door and stood back for him to enter. “Daniel.”
“Madelyn.”
“Have a seat. I have to get out of these heels.”
“You should be wearing sensible shoes anyway.”
Midway across the room she turned. “What did you say?”
He yanked down the Stetson. “Never mind. I came to talk about my mother.”
She was across the room in no time. “Is she all right?”
“Of course she’s all right,” he admitted, not sounding the least happy about it. “I haven’t seen her this happy in a long time. That’s why I’m here. You can’t keep on giving her false hope.”
Madelyn slipped off one of her heels and resisted the urge to throw it at Daniel’s head. “I think you better leave.”
He didn’t budge. “Why are you doing this?”
“Why do you think? I’m not trying to trap you into marriage or ask for a chunk out of your portfolio. I have no reason to lie.”
He gave the brim of his Stetson another good yank. “Maybe the father’s a jerk.”
Slipping off the other shoe, she said, “There’s no maybe to it.”
His mouth flattened into a straight line. “My mother spends more time with you than she does with me.”
“That’s because you’re out every night.”
“Business,” he told her and watched her roll her eyes. Gritting his teeth, he gave his hat another yank. He didn’t have to hide anything. His life was his own—at least until Madelyn came into his life.
He couldn’t stop thinking about her, worrying about her. The women he had taken out hadn’t helped. They only made him miss Madelyn more. He could hardly wait to take them home.
Madelyn folded her arms across her chest. “If there is nothing else, it’s after seven and I have to get to the
gym.”
“What! Are you crazy?” he yelled, outraged. “You can’t do tae kwon do classes in your condition! What’s wrong with you?”
“They’re pregnancy exercise classes, Daniel,” she said patiently.
“Oh.” Damned if he didn’t feel his face flush. Flushing, for goodness’ sake! She made him act like a raving fool.
“I really must get going.”
His gaze locked on her soft lips—lips he was desperately trying not to remember how good they felt on his, how much he wanted to feel them again.
She was too close. The light fragrance she wore beckoned him to lean closer. He had to get out of there before he did something stupid. The book said a woman’s breasts changed during this time, becoming more sensitive, larger. The areolae darker.
He wondered. His hand lifted toward her red jacket.
“Daniel, are you all right?”
He snatched his hand down. Disgust rolled through him. He was turning into a pervert. “I’m late for an appointment.”
He almost ran from her apartment. He didn’t dare look back.
* * *
Daniel fully expected his mother to grill him over seeing Madelyn when he arrived home. He had no doubt she knew about his going to see her. He was ready for the interrogation, the prodding. Only his mother wasn’t there.
He didn’t need to guess where she was. His own mother had gone over to the side of the enemy. She didn’t even pretend to be on his side.
He always knew his mother could be stubborn, and he was realizing just how stubborn. Her father had told Daniel more than once how stubborn she was. She had grown up thinking everything she wanted, she should have. Usually she wasn’t disappointed.
The way the story went, she had seen his father at a Native American rodeo in New Mexico, and that was that. None of them could believe a pampered young woman who had always had servants had lived happily in a little two-room cabin for almost five months, cooking meals over a wooden stove and sweeping the floor with a straw broom.
John Henry had taken Daniel there once, and he hadn’t believed it, either. The log cabin was on a dot of land that scorpions shunned. His father had had to drive fifteen miles one way over rutted roads to work as a ranch hand.
They had certainly loved each other, endured hardships to stay together—yet they hadn’t been able to hold their marriage together.
Getting up, Daniel went to stand by the window in his study downstairs. If not for him, they might never have gotten married. Their worlds had collided instead of merging when they left that cabin.
He didn’t want that for himself. Or Madelyn.
He had learned at a young age what happened when love wasn’t enough. The lesson was reinforced each time his father couldn’t take the pressure of his mother trying to turn him into something he wasn’t and took off for Oklahoma. Daniel had grown up knowing if not for him, his parents’ lives might have taken a different, happier path.
What his parents hadn’t taught him about was how easily love could turn into harshly spoken words and accusations, Jeanette had. She had been an expert teacher. Beautiful, vibrant, and poised, Jeanette had been so easy to be with—and then overnight he hadn’t been able to stand the sight of her.
She had killed any love he might have had for her, then she had killed herself.
He was never going to let another person depend on him for their emotional well-being and happiness, especially when he knew the high failure rate.
Never. Snapping off the light, he slowly climbed the stairs and went to his room.
Whatever game his mother had going on, he was not going to play.
* * *
Daniel was already eating breakfast when Felicia came down the next morning looking elegant as usual in an ice-blue pantsuit. “Good morning, Mother.”
“Good morning, Daniel.” Kissing his cheek, she took her seat. Almost immediately a servant was at her elbow. “Just juice and toast, please.”
Daniel set down his coffee cup. “Eating light?”
“I’m having lunch with Madelyn. I always overindulge. She might be eating for two, but that’s no reason for me to gain the pounds.” She glanced up and smiled as the servant placed her juice and coffee on the table. “Thank you, Helen.”
Here it comes, Daniel thought.
“What are your plans today, dear?” Daintily she lifted her cup and drank.
His smile was pure innocence. “Flexible.”
“Good,” she commented.
“Is there something you wanted me to do?” he asked, tired of the charade.
“Oh, no. You simply work too hard, and I’m glad you have a light schedule.” Getting up from the table, she kissed him on the cheek. “Have a nice day.”
Daniel watched his mother leave the room, then grinned. He had walked right into that one. She was enjoying herself at his expense.
Yet there was nothing she wouldn’t do to protect her children.
The smile slid from his face. Once that had included almost destroying the man she loved.
Chapter 10
Pick up the phone, Madelyn, Daniel silently demanded. His fingers bit into the plastic when the answering machine clicked on. The deep, melodious tone of Kane’s voice was starting to irritate him.
Disgusted, Daniel slammed down the phone. There was no sense leaving another message. She hadn’t answered the three from yesterday.
Where the hell could she be this early on a Saturday morning? She wasn’t at home, that was for sure. He had gone by there before seven this morning and late last night. Both times her Acura was gone.
When he tracked her down, he had something to tell her. This time he wouldn’t choke. He’d make sure she understood he wanted her to stop seeing his mother. It was bad enough trying to forget her without his mother being a constant reminder of her.
“What was that noise?”
Daniel whirled to see his mother wearing a navy-blue and white pantsuit, standing in the study doorway. The frown cleared on her face on seeing his hand on the telephone. “Is something wrong?”
His mother would know. She looked too happy with herself for the past two weeks not to be in contact with the woman she thought was carrying her first grandchild. He wasn’t going to ask her though.
She’d like nothing better than to see him and Madelyn get together. It wasn’t going to happen in this lifetime. Then the picture of Madelyn being hurt and alone somewhere flashed into his mind.
“I can’t find Madelyn.” Was that his voice that held a mixture of pique and desperation?
Frowning she stepped farther into the room. “Last night she didn’t mention she expected to see you.”
“You saw her last night?” he questioned, crossing the room. “When? Where?”
“We went to the movies together.” His mother shuddered delicately. “I can’t believe some of the things that pass for entertainment these days. All that blood and gore.”
“You didn’t let her see anything that might upset her, did you?” he asked, his tone accusing.
She tilted her head. “I see you weren’t worried about me.”
He refused to back down. “You’re not in her condition.” No matter how childish it was, he still couldn’t say the word out loud.
His mother had no such problem. “By condition do you mean her pregnancy? Say it, Daniel. It won’t turn you into stone.”
But it would make him think of the unknown father. As long as he separated Madelyn from the baby, he was fine.
His mother patted his cheek when he remained silent. “Poor Daniel, one day you’re going to have to make a decision on this, and I hope it’s the right one.”
He didn’t want to talk about it. “What kind of movie did you see?”
“One that upset us both. A love story that ended tragically. We both cried buckets. Life does imitate art.” She looked sad for a moment, then started toward the small dining room off the kitchen.
Daniel didn’t know if she was talking about her l
ove life or his, but he was leaving both alone. “If you saw her last night, then you know where she is.”
“Of course I do. I must eat breakfast, I’m going sailing this morning,” she told him as she entered the dining room.
“Where is she?” he asked, pulling out a peach-covered chair for her.
She took the seat and was immediately served. “Why, she’s gone, dear.”
The word caught him off guard, plummeting him downward. “Gone?” He plopped into a chair. She couldn’t leave him—she couldn’t.
“Daniel, are you all right? Maybe Will can take a look at you when he shows up.”
“Will?”
“He’s a friend of Dr. Scalar and a dermatologist. Dr. Scalar introduced us,” she answered, pressing the back of her hand to Daniel’s forehead. “You work too hard.”
“When did you meet Dr. Scalar?”
“Wednesday, when I went with Madelyn to her appointment,” Felicia explained, helping herself to a blueberry muffin.
“Is something wrong?” His heart pounded in his chest.
“No, she’s fine.” She took a bite of the muffin.
“Then why did she ask you to go?” Daniel asked, still not convinced.
Felicia dabbed her mouth with her napkin before answering. “She didn’t ask me to go. I asked her. I wanted to meet the man who’s going to deliver my grandchild.”
Daniel was caught between reminding his mother he wasn’t the father and gaining more information. “If Scalar’s going to do the delivery, then why did she leave?”
“She didn’t leave. She just flew home for her niece and nephew’s birthday party,” Felicia told him, sipping her coffee.
The tension snapped back into him. If Kane and Matt found out, there’d be hell to pay. If they upset her, they’d be the ones to pay. “To Hallsville. How long ago did she leave?”
Felicia glanced at the slim gold watch on her wrist. “Her flight left two hours ago, at seven. I offered to take her to the airport since her car wasn’t ready as promised. I thought a tune-up was simple. People don’t take pride in their work anymore.”
Daniel didn’t like the way his mother had looked at him when she made her last statement. “How did she get to the airport?”
